One of the prosecution’s most compelling pieces of evidence was recorded audio that it said placed Murdaugh at the crime scene on the night of the murders. The hanger and dog kennels where Paul and Maggie’s bodies were found at the Murdaugh’s Moselle property in Islandton, South Carolina. Waters added that Alex Murdaugh had this shotgun with him on the night of the killings and that “Maggie’s DNA and blood” were found on the receiver of the gun. Investigators determined that the two shells that killed Paul had “class characteristics” that were similar to a 12-gauge shotgun. Paul Murdaugh was killed by shots from a shotgun, one of Paul’s “favorite guns,” Waters said.
Waters noted this weapon went missing and Murdaugh could not account for it. Testimony from a weapons expert proved that Blackout rifle bullet casings discovered near Maggie’s body matched casings found on other parts of the family’s property. Maggie was killed by a Blackout rifle and Paul was killed by a shotgun, prosecutor Creighton Waters said, adding that both were family weapons. A hearing in that civil case was scheduled for June 10, 2021, and had the potential to reveal his financial problems, prosecutors argued. Second, Murdaugh was facing a lawsuit from the family of Mallory Beach, a 19-year-old who was killed in February 2019 when a boat, owned by Murdaugh and allegedly driven by Paul, crashed. After the murders, the internal investigation into the funds took a backseat. Two investigations in particular that could have exposed Murdaugh’s wrongdoing were coming to a head at the time of the killings.įor one, the chief financial officer of his law firm testified she had confronted Murdaugh about missing funds on the morning of June 7, 2021, hours before the killings. A “day of reckoning” was coming from several different angles, so he killed his family to distract and delay those financial investigations, the prosecution argued.
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The case hinged on circumstantial evidence: Proving Murdaugh was at the crime scene that night and that he lied to investigators, and painting him as a fraudster who killed his family in a desperate bid to distract the investigations into his actions.Ī series of witnesses have accused Murdaugh of extensive financial wrongdoing at his namesake law firm and presented evidence that he lied to nearly everyone around him in a yearslong fraud. Despite the lack of direct evidence, the prosecution spent weeks outlining how Murdaugh had the motive, means and opportunity to commit the murders. (Handout)Īlex Murdaugh has been convicted Thursday of killing his wife and son.
Investigators said no bullets were found in the soil underneath Maggie’s body to suggest shots were fired downward by someone standing directly over her.Maggie, Paul and Alex Murdaugh. The gunshot wound to her head was immediately fatal, according to the report. The report says the gunman may have been behind Maggie to her left side, but Kinsey said he could not determine the exact position of the shooter. Maggie Murdaugh, whose body was found a short distance away, was shot five times with a rifle in her torso, upper abdomen, thigh, wrist, and head.
Kinsey said he believes the phone was taken out of Paul’s pocket by someone else after he was killed and the blood stain was produced during its retrieval.Ĭourt documents filed on Thursday state that records from Snapchat are part of the prosecution’s evidence. Kinsey said, in his opinion, there is no evidence of a struggle between Paul Murdaugh and the shooter.Īccording to the report, a cell phone in Paul Murdaugh’s back pocket had been removed and a blood stain was found inside the pocket.
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